Open Writing

Imagine … in the space of a month I have opened a Twitter account and started a blog, in addition to running my column on Open Writing and beginning the serialisation of my novel. How can this be? I mean, two years ago I was reluctant to use a cell phone. What's happened?

Lots of things, actually. It all began with me finding someone who was willing to drive me to church meetings on my own. I had to carry a cell phone so that she would know when to fetch me. It was a simple matter of need. Then, as I attended meetings and began enjoying peoples' company again, I began reaching out to old friends via email. That was how I found out about Open Writing, and the web magazine played its own part in inspiring me to go further. Editor Peter Hinchliffe has been enormously encouraging of my efforts and deserves much of the credit for my decision to self-publish through the entrepreneurial arm of amazon.com. This step created its own impetus, motivating me to learn tricks of the trade from self-publishing experts around the world. It was one in particular, Joel Friedlander, who recommended social networking and blogging as necessary elements of a book-marketing campaign.

Blindness wasn't an obstacle once my enthusiasm was fired. As I have explained before, text-reading software makes navigating the internet a breeze, and all you have to do to get good at it is practise. Turns out I love practising! Twitter is most commonly used as a mobile networking platform in our country, but it offers much more value as a tool for accessing information. I use Twitter on my laptop and link instantly to the most fascinating articles you can imagine. It's like having my own custom-designed newspaper, supplying articles on only the topics I find interesting. Miraculous, I say!

But to the point of this column: Having heard that blogging is a must for authors these days, I was keen to start. My husband said I should take my time, which was the sensible thing to do, though I could hardly wait! A week was all I managed, and in that week I did all the preparation work that was necessary to get off to a resounding start. I researched the how-to's of blogging, practised writing posts in a standard text document, visited other blogs to discover how they did it, and drew up my mission statement. My blog would be a supporting structure for the publication of my novel, but it would offer much more than information about the book itself. It would give readers insight into my reasons for writing fiction and my passions beyond fiction-writing - which obviously include different kinds of sight and the evolution of religious observance into conscious living.

I called the blog Diamond Panes, to fit in with my Lattice Windows theme. I think it's a nice touch, don't you? My daughter Tammy did a great job of finding an image that would give my blog a strong visual identity, and from what I can see, it's very effective.

But the real work of a blog is writing posts, the kind of posts that attract regular visitors and build a strong web presence. I chose to write daily, five days a week, to accommodate my seemingly endless supply of words. Productivity breeds productivity, I've found, and posting on the internet is a great energy-release for someone who can't stop the ideas from flowing!

Now that I've started, I know what all the buzz is about. blogging is really fun. I get inspired when I read about bloggers who have been at it for five or more years. I love the idea of an online community with whom you can share and exchange points of view. Hopefully, my blog will become a place for blind visionaries and sighted seekers-in-darkness to meet and share experiences. It beats traipsing around to church meetings in the hope of perhaps hearing one or two inspirational remarks. Blogging is a way to generate exactly the kind of conversations you most want to be part of - and I hope you'll drop by to sample the subtle illumination.